Kinmen

English

金門航空站 Kinmen Airport

Alternative forms

• Jinmen (Hanyu Pinyin)
• Chinmen, Chin-men (Wade–Giles)

Etymology

From the Nanking court dialect (later Postal Romanization) romanization of Mandarin 金門 (Jīnmén), from before the modern palatalization of /k/ to /tɕ/, parallel with names for the four townships of Kinmen Island: Kincheng, Kinhu, Kinning, and Kinsha.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɪn(ˌ)mɛn/, /ˈkɪn(ˌ)mən/

Proper noun

Kinmen

1. A county of Taiwan.
   • 2007 February 14, Ralph Jennings, “Chinese tourists flock to Taiwan's Kinmen island”, in Reuters‎^[4], archived from the original on 10 July 2016:

     Kinmen County, an island chain with a population of 76,000, is catering to Chinese tourists by converting military facilities into tourist traps and building museums with wartime themes.

   • 2015, Alan Taylor, “Taiwan's Kinmen Islands, Only a Few Miles From Mainland China”, in The Atlantic‎^[5]:

     Shiyu, or Lion Islet, part of Kinmen County, one of Taiwan’s offshore islands, seen in front of Xiamen, China, on September 8, 2015.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:Kinmen.
2. An island in Kinmen County, Taiwan.
   • 1950 July 7, Dean Acheson, “The Secretary of State to the Embassy in China”, in Foreign Relations of the United States 1950‎^[6], volume 6, United States Government Printing Office, published 1976, →OCLC, page 371:

     5. Chi Govt wishes to call attn of US Govt again to fact that Chi Govt is at present maintaining positions on a nr of islands such as Lintin and Lema Islands off Canton, Kinmen Island off Amoy, Matsu Island off Foochow, Tachen Islands off Chekiang Province, etc. These island positions, together with those on the Pescadores, form part of the defense of Taiwan. They are guarded by considerable nr of ground troops with the support of air and naval forces. They have been, however, under constant attacks by Chi Commies, and Chi milit command feels obliged to resist these attacks in self-defense. Chi Govt will appreciate it if US Govt wld indicate its views regarding the matter.

   • 1966, 中華醫學雜誌‎^[7], volume 13, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 158:

     The whole Kinmen island complex was divided into 7 operation areas, namely, Tatan, Erhtan, Small Kinmen, and Kinchen-Kinshan, Kinning, Kinhu and Kinsa on Kinmen.

   • 1995 December 9, “An old-fashioned election”, in The Economist‎^[8], volume 337, number 7944, pages 34–39:

     KINMEN
     THE little island of Kinmen, three miles off the Chinese coast, must be the world's most heavily defended.
     . . .
     This week it was learnt that in March China's military leaders plan "Operation Kinmen", a simulated invasion of the island, on the eve of Taiwan's first election for the presidency in which all adult Taiwanese will be able to vote. On Kinmen itself, the Taiwanese are declining to panic.

   • 2012, Mark Henshaw, Red Cell‎^[9], →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 110:

     The PLA had landed several battalions on the beaches and suffered immediate counterattacks by the Nationalist “Kinmen Bears” riding in American M5 A1 tanks for which the Communists had no counter. Fifteen thousand men had died in less than three days. The victory left Kinmen itself a hallowed ground in the minds of the Taiwanese.

   • 2020, Gerry Shih, “On China’s front line, emerging Cold War haunts battle-worn Taiwanese islands”, in Washington Post‎^[10]:

     Arguments over Kinmen's relationship with China swing between "accusing someone of either jeopardizing the most crucial geopolitical relationship of all or committing treason," said Michael Szonyi, director of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University and the author of "Cold War Island," a book about Kinmen.
     "Virtually every local issue on Kinmen, no matter how small, gets linked to the larger geopolitical context of how to relate to a rising and changing China," Szonyi said. "These are exactly the same questions that Taiwan, that Africa and Latin America, that even the United States are increasingly grappling with."

   • 2022 August 5, Amy Chang Chien, John Liu, Paul Mozur, “As Missiles Fall, Generations Split on Taiwan’s Relationship With China”, in The New York Times‎^[11], →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 05 August 2022, China-Taiwan Tensions‎^[12]:

     The San Jiao Fort cafe on Kinmen Island may well be the best place in Taiwan to watch for the threat of invasion by China. […]
     A handful of people on the Taiwanese islands near China did catch a glimpse of the drills. On Kinmen, Chiu Yi-hsuan, a 39-year-old owner of an independent bookstore, said she felt a shock wave on Thursday. “At first I thought it was thunder, then I realized it wasn’t,” she said.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:Kinmen.

Synonyms

• (from Zhangzhou Hokkien) Quemoy

Derived terms

• Kinmenese

Translations

county of the Republic of China (Taiwan)

• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 金門／金门 (gam¹ mun⁴)

  Hokkien: 金門／金门 (Kim-mn̂g, Kim-mûi)

  Mandarin: 金門／金门 (zh) (Jīnmén)

• Japanese: 金門 (きんもん, Kinmon)
• Korean: 진먼 (jinmeon)
• Russian: Цзиньмэнь (Czinʹmɛnʹ)
• Vietnamese: Kim Môn

Further reading

• Kinmen, Quemoy, Jinmen, Chinmen, Chin-men at the Google Books Ngram Viewer.
• “Kinmen”, in Collins English Dictionary.
• “Kinmen”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “Kinmen” in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2024.

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kin.mɛn/

Proper noun

Kinmen ?

1. Kinmen (a county of Taiwan)